Pages

Saturday, June 02, 2012

Welcome to the Friday Farm Fix, a new series on Farmgirl Fare where I share a random sampling (that sometimes appears on Saturdays) of what's been happening around the farm during the past week. Just joining us? You'll find all the Friday Farm Fix posts here.

The word of this past week was definitely PEEP! It seems like there are baby chicks hatching everywhere, including another one since last night. The chick pics were starting to take over this post, though, so instead I'll do a separate peep report in the next few days. Maybe the number of new babies will have stabilized by then. In the meantime, they sure are cute to watch.

A brief respite from the unseasonable heat and humidity, along with just under an inch of rain (woohoo!), has made us (and the entire farm) very happy indeed. We turned off the a/c and even put a blanket on the bed last night. We're headed right back into another heat wave, but at least the dust has settled and the grass in the fields doesn't crunch as much when you walk on it. They're even teasing us with more rain in the 10-day forecast.

The garden is at that point where everything seems to be suddenly taking off. One day you're delighted to spot a couple of baby beans, and just a few days later you're filling up a colander.

We've been enjoying the first sweet and crunchy, easy to grow Dragon Tongue beans (I love them raw), pretty salads starring Parris Island cos lettuce, and spring onions galore. The flea beetles have been enjoying pretty much everything. Fortunately their nibbling doesn't usually kill plants. The first Japanese beetles have already been spotted; fingers crossed their numbers—and their damage—won't be nearly as bad as last year. They do kill stuff.

It's hard to believe it's already the beginning of June, although it's pretty much felt like June since March. The echinacea (purple coneflower) just started blooming. We'll be picking juicy, ripe tomatoes before you know it.

20 comments:

Hi Susan! I love your pictures! Last week a farmer showed me how flea beetles will go after mustard and leave other stuff alone.He plants a short row amongst crops and lures the beetles to the mustard.

Happy Joe is doing better! Happy too that your Swiss Chard is prolific. Last year I froze SC and kale for the first time and was so glad I did. I blanched the shreds for 2-1/2 minutes, plunged into ice bath, wrung in kitchen towel (which is still delightfully greenish today :)) and froze in single layer on sheet pan, then into gallon zip bags. All winter we could pull out handfuls which cooked up in no time when we wanted a snappy, healthy homegrown green. I have you to thank for encouraging me to grow Swiss Chard and we all are so grateful! Enjoy your bounty.

All kidding aside, our animals do get along remarkably well, though not all the time. Of course being with other species are stock dog Bear and livestock guardians Daisy and Marta's jobs.

As for the photo of beagle Bert in (his) bed with Molly Doodlebug (aka The Doodle Monster), she climbed in with him because she couldn't get him to vacate that spot with her death stare, and now he's too terrified to move. ;)

Susan, I just love that last photo you posted. It is so metaphoric for life. Most of the pic is horizontal and serene (but not boring) but the circle of barbed wire on the fence line seems to represent the ever-cyclical stages of the seasons, and if you look closely you see some of the barbs that we inevitably experience in life that give it the texture and challenge that we all experience even when it seems serene from a distance. Thanks so much for sharing snippets of your life. You must be so busy.

Lovely photos! We, too, tossed a blanket on our bed the last few nights. Unfortunately no rain, though, and none predicted for anytime soon. How about you give your rain clouds a little shove northward? :)

It's looking very BOOM! on the farm :) I just spotted the very first tiny green marble tomatoes on the plants this morning, so it's getting all BOOM! around here in CA, too. Though I don't have any super painfully cute fluffy chicks to cuddle. I'd be tempted to carry one around in my pocket while doing farm chores.

Meanwhile, the photo of Molly Doodlebug in the window had me cracking up. She's a freak.

I loved the before and after pictures of the Swiss chard and lemon balm! What a difference!Good to hear Joe's back is doing better! :)It's hard to believe that our growing season here in AZ is behind yours, my echinacea is just now budding out! :)

Hi Susan. What a delightful collection of photos that show your farm life so well. I so happy that rain has come your way and more is forecast to come, and that HFG Joe is doing better. I do much of the outside work on our place (except for the really big jobs like chain sawing and berry whacking) and I know you do too, so to think of you taking on even more while Joe was hurt made me wince for you. In your shoes, I think I would just sit down and cry. ;) So I'm glad to know things are getting back to normal.

Dear Susan,I have been following your blog for the last few years and am looking forward to each new post! I even tried a number of your food recipes, including the wonderful tomato basil pizza, the picture of which I posted on my Flickr page, in case you would like to take a look:-):

http://www.flickr.com/photos/visum/sets/72157623122535100/

I was wondering if you would share with me your lemon balm sun tea recipe? I have lots of beautiful lemon balm ready to be cut. I usually combine lemon balm, spearmint and mint in tea making but find the lemon balm aloneon to have an unappealing taste.

Hi MMD,My apologies for the delayed reply. I'm still trying to figure out where the last few weeks went, lol.

Your pizza is beautiful! And your mint tea sounds like a perfect combination. I'll have to try it. As for my lemon balm sun tea - there isn't a recipe, it's more like The Lazy Girl's Way To Make Sun Tea:

Take a half gallon canning jar (I LOVE these jars) and stuff some fresh lemon balm into it. Fill with water. Stick in the sun. :)

I have noticed that sometimes the leaves will darken in the water and the tea won't taste as good. I'm not sure if it has something to do with the age of the leaves - I haven't done any scientific experimenting.

I simply love your blog. The pictures makes me want to pack my bags and drive out to the middle of no where and start this set up. I think its the bestest life possible. Fresh air, fresh food, surrounded by little creatures. I'd be so HAPPY living it.

January 2013 update: I know word verification is a big pain, but it's the only way I can stop the ridiculous number of anonymous spam comments I get every day. I don't want to require commenters to be registered Blogger or Open ID users because I know many of you aren't. Thanks so much for your understanding!

Hi! Thanks for visiting Farmgirl Fare and taking the time to write. While I'm not always able to reply to every comment, I receive and enjoy reading them all.

Your feedback is greatly appreciated, and I especially love hearing about your experiences with my recipes. Comments on older posts are always welcome!

Please note that I moderate comments, so if I'm away from the computer it may be a while before yours appears.

I try my best to answer all questions, though sometimes it takes me a few days. And sometimes, I'm sorry to say, they fall through the cracks, and for that I sincerely apologize.

If you're waiting for a reply to your comment and have a Blogger profile (it's free to create one) you can check the NOTIFY ME box that is below and receive all follow up comments to just this specific post via email.

I look forward to hearing from you and hope you enjoy your e-visits to our farm!